"The greatest part of mankind may be divided into two classes; that of shallow thinkers, who fall short of the truth, and that of abstruse thinkers, who go beyond it."

"We make allowance for a certain degree of selfishness in men; because we know it to be inseparable from human nature, and inherent in our frame and constitution."

"The life of man is a perpetual flux of motion. All his thoughts, sentiments, and actions are in a continual succession, and never remain for any considerable time in the same state."

"The imagination is a great source of error."

"All our ideas are nothing but copies of our impressions, or, in other words, that it is impossible for us to think of anything, which we have not antecedently felt, either by our external or internal …"